Vanilla, Strawberry or Chocolate

Vanilla, Strawberry or Chocolate
Originally uploaded by darenpackham.

A very dodgy looking ice cream sales man..

Check this out

Check this out
Originally uploaded by darenpackham.

Ok I lied. I did actually leave the boat this week but only so that I could take photos of this slightly impressive but also vulgar display of wealth.

You will just about see in the picture a small boat parked at the back, under the garage door. This boat, is the limosine taxi tender, it is actually over 10 meters long and is worth $1Million!!!

The other thing that strikes me when I look at this picture, is......they have employed a dodgy looking ice cream salesman as the first officer and that looks like a lot of responsibility to me....Are they mad!!

Little sister

Little sister
Originally uploaded by darenpackham.

I am sad to say that the blog has become very boring boaty lately. This is because the work play balance has completely stopped being a balance all together. It is now just work and all other life is on hold until I can blagg some leave.
You can see from the picture that our little sister arrived alongside for this week. Tthere is incredibly, only room to sleep 12 guests on the big boat so the little one (115 feet) is here as the granny flat..!

April

April
Originally uploaded by darenpackham.

Deck 3 today

January

Jan
Originally uploaded by darenpackham.

Deck 3 in January

How to immediately stop 7 guys from working

Crew Distractions
Originally uploaded by darenpackham.

During the Barcelona Olympics, Sevilla was the host for all of the rowing events and since then, the facilities here on the Guadalaquivir river are used by people coming for week long training breaks.

Every day, there is a constant procession of rowers and kayakers passing by the boat. Single sculls, doubles, 4 up and then the 8's!

The best way in the world to distract 7 horney sailors from their work is to send rowing boats, full of 8 sexy and very fit looking young women past the boat at regular intervals. This never fails to stop the whole deck team in their tracks. Not surprising then, that the port side of the boat (the river side) is far cleaner than the starboard side (the side against the dock.) The other thing about the 8's is that there is 7 of us! meaning that there is an overlap! Either one of them will be unlucky or one of us very lucky indeed.

Of course, in the entire 2 and a half weeks that we have been here in Sevilla, no one has so much as bumped into a female rower, let alone, have enough spanish to charm one of them out of her tight rowing shorts.

Winning it back

Winning it back
Originally uploaded by darenpackham.

Slowly but surely the boat has been transformed from the mess that we were left with from Savannah, back into a spectacular super yacht. All the tubs are bubbling away and the cushions and furniture are out ready to accept our first guests this week.

Football

Football
Originally uploaded by darenpackham.

Something entirely different for me, was last weeks excursion to watch a football match. It was 'Real Batis' playing the guys in black shirts from somewhere else in Spain..
I actually enjoyed it. It was surprising that the kick off time was 1030 in the evening and that for a fairly uninteresting game, there was fifty thousand folks there until mid night watching it.
My brother will be proud of me.

Frday afternoon

Frday afternoon
Originally uploaded by darenpackham.

Well..The sun did come out and it was friday afternoon and the speed boats did need to be given a run so who better.
je suis une rock star!

Have a good weekend. We will of course, still be painting and scrubbing and cleaning all weekend because we spent too much time arsing about doing rock star jobs instead of getting on with it.

??????

Well it looks ok?
Originally uploaded by darenpackham.

Well......It kind of looks ok. Do you think we have them on the right way round? "That one looks funny to me".
"Na it's good enough, lets stand around here a bit longer then go for a cup of tea."

Rock Star jobs

Rock Star jobs
Originally uploaded by darenpackham.

I wonder? Which part of the job title, ' A bit of a sailor boy' does putting on Helicopter rotor blades come under...?..and...Would you be happy to fly in this chopper?

There are some jobs on the boat that I call 'Rock Star' jobs. They are the jobs everyone wants to do. These include pretty much anything at all to do with the helicopter or fast speed boats.

Today even though there was a thousand other jobs to do and we are all under pressure, everyone including myself, took time to help or watch the putting on of the heli rotor blades.

good as new

good as new
Originally uploaded by darenpackham.

When I had my own boat I thought, I wonder what I could do if there was no budget. I worked on boats and said, 'wouldn't it be great if there was no budget'. The problem when there is and endless budget, is that you have to make everything perfect and that is the near impossible trick. We are slowly winning.
We are all running around saying oh my goodness only a few days till the owner arrives! He is probably sitting at home thinking, Oh good, its only a few days before I get on the boat for a few weeks.

flight past the heli deck

flight past the heli deck
Originally uploaded by darenpackham.

After cleaning our giant balls from the teetering hieght of the crane we went on a tourist flight past the heli deck.

Extreme Ball Washing

Extreme Ball Washing
Originally uploaded by darenpackham.

I don't know why he is looking so relaxed! We are 80 feet up in the air and I had only 30 seconds of rudimentry training, in spanish, of how to operate the man lift / extendible ball washing cage. Funnily enough, my spanish lessons in Brighton didn't cover words and phrases associated
with crane driving!

Big Balls

Big Balls
Originally uploaded by darenpackham.

When you have giant sized balls you have a giant hygiene problem! That is to say, when those big balls get a bit dirty. How the hell do you get them clean again?

Seville by bike

Its Easter Sunday and I was able to enjoy a couple of cherished hours away from the boat.

Having my bicycle on board is a rare treat and there is no better way to find your bearings in a new city than on two wheels. Especially in a part of the world where cyclists are treated to cycle paths. Sorry America. You definitely have this wrong and its a refreshing change not to feel intimidated by the traffic.

As you can see Sevilla is a beautiful city and it was a pleasure to get up early and cycle around.

Happy Easter everyone.

High spirits

High spirits
Originally uploaded by darenpackham.

As you can see, spirits were high

A great venue

A great venue
Originally uploaded by darenpackham.

The Party deck really is a wonderful venue, even though most of the furniture is still covered you can get the idea

Dinner and drinks on deck

Dinner and drinks on deck
Originally uploaded by darenpackham.

Good Friday was wash down day! The whole deck team were washing down and getting rid of all the caked salt and making the ship gleam again. Brendan declared saturday a day off and organised the chefs to have drinks and dinner serevd on the party deck to celebrate our safe arrival and the start of a busy summer season in the Med.

As you can see it all started very civilised.

Arrived in Seville

Arrived in Seville
Originally uploaded by darenpackham.

4000 miles later we arrived in Seville. The pretty European city of Seville sits 50 miles up a winding river in the south west of Spain.

Thankfully our journey accross went well with only minor causes for concern. I have to admit to feeling slightly nervous as we lost one of our main engines (its pretty carless to lose something that big!) right as we entered the narrow channel at the approaches to Seville. Our options were very limited so we continued on one engine until the engineers managed to do their thing. and we were tied up on the dock in the centre of town by 730 in the evening on Thursday before Easter.

Fire Drill

Fire Drill
Originally uploaded by darenpackham.

Today we found some better weather and what better way to spend an afternoon than in a whole boat fire drill..
Alarms, watertight doors, smoke doors, search and rescue for casualties in the engine room, the whole 9 yards.

Tomorrow we arrive in Seville. Just in time for the largest fiesta on the Spanish calendar! it will apparently make St Patricks in Savannah look like a village fete by comparison. So just like last year in the Canary Islands, I will have to go and dance in the streets till the wee small hours.

Horta on the Island of Faial, Acores

Horta on the Island of Faial, Acores
Originally uploaded by darenpackham.

We didn't even stay here for 24 hours but it will remain a happy memory on this journey.

Horta is a port of refuge. Most people here have been fighting big seas and heavy weather and are crossing the atlantic one way or another. As I have said before, the heavy weather that we were are able to just shrug off with a push of a window wiper button is a very differnt story for the guys on regular size cruising yachts.

The spirit that I miss from the tall ships and sailing boats is very evident here on this small island. They, by hook or by crook have fought a storm, reefed in thier sails, held onto a kicking wheel and have ridden like a sleigh down rolling seas while feeling the wind and spray on thier cold scared faces.

In the Bar. There is always a bar. The first one you come to out of the harbour, is where you will find these people, they are alive and pleased for it. There was a Polish tall ship in harbour and they were all singing drunkenly, out of tune but together in the spirit of a crew who had been through something together. We were also having a fun time but I know its just not the same! After seeing that for the first time as an 'outsider' I know that my stay on motor boats will be reletively short lived. I don't think that you can properly acknowledge a trans atlantic passage under power in the same way. I felt like a bit of a cheat .
Enjoying the challenges of this for now though and am still slightly overwhealmed with it sometimes.

Monkey Business

monkey business
Originally uploaded by darenpackham.

Funny things happen when you are out at sea. Especially if it is the eve of April and of course April fools day!

There was a sign on the crew mess notice board, that the owner of the boat had requested us to take on fuel in the Acores and turn around altering course for Mexico. This had a few people going but the best for me, was a gorilla! It was seen walking up to the security cameras in the middle of the night. Bonkers!! This was its pass through the area that we call the beach club..

40 knots of wind

40 knots of wind
Originally uploaded by darenpackham.

It is always funny how bad weather never comes accross well in pictures.
Our bow is 5 meters above the water and waves were constantly breaking over the fore deck

Wiper controls

Wiper controls
Originally uploaded by darenpackham.

So as I was saying. It got quite rough and my favorite bridge control was used often..

We have altered course for the Acores in order to fix a small problem. Thank you, Savannah. One of the pipe fitters had failed to connect a pipe to one of our fuel tanks. One that has 43 tons of fuel in it!
Luckily we were only 300 miles from Horta in the Acores which is where we are now tied alongside waiting to take on fuel and make a fix to our tanks.

Veggies or Girlies

Veggie or Girlies
Originally uploaded by darenpackham.

If I have to get into a life raft you had better put me in with vegitarians, or at least lots of pretty girls.

Ships routine continues and our drills and musters are an important part of ship board life.